Notice the seven major, broad overviews within which mankind's specific responsibilities are addressed:

1. This covenant introduces the sovereign Creator God Himself. In Genesis 1:1-5, He stands alone; the focus is on Him and what He wants us to learn first about Him. He stands at the beginning of all things and precedes everything. Everything He gives to man—God is the sovereign Creator and Giver of every good gift—he must use responsibly within God's purpose. This pattern of focusing on the sovereign Creator God and His purposes appears in all covenants with Him. God rules!

2. This covenant reveals that He is orderly. Every step in creation is taken in a scientifically logical progression, establishing that the creation and His purposes are not haphazard. Randomness is not part of His nature. God is purposeful and already has a plan that He is following step by step.

3. In the beginning, like God Himself, everything was morally perfect. No sin is present, nor are any demons there to interrupt His thoughtful construction of a practical and beautiful place for Him to work out His purpose for mankind.

4. No aspect of the creation is to be worshipped. Everything God made and gave to mankind is a product of and inferior to the One who made all things. No animal or object is to be used as an intermediary between the Creator and mankind. Only the Creator is to be worshipped.

5. Beginning with Adam and Eve, humanity is charged with populating the earth and subduing it. Men are not to have an adversarial relationship with the earth but to harness its potential and use its resources for human benefit. In this case, subduing indicates activities like cultivating its fields and mining it for mineral riches. Mankind is not to rape the earth but to work to manage properly what he has been given. Humans, created in God's image, are to exercise their God-given authority as His servants to care for the earth as He would. That is, men are to follow God's pattern. There is, of course, far more to being made in His likeness, but ruling is part of the reason for it.

6. Simply being born gives a person a stewardship responsibility. People are to treat God's wonderful gifts with the same loving care in which God designed and created them.

7. Mankind is to enjoy the foods produced in the Garden as well as the bountiful productivity God placed within humanity's purview.

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